146 



their -constituent parts. It is also a very powerful agent 

 -in the dissolution of the tame bodies. 



32. That fixed air is a cementing principle appears 

 '(to omit 'Others) from that well known experiment. 

 Quick lime dissolves flesh by extracting and imbibing, 

 the fixed air which it contained. But while the flesh 

 falls in pieces from the loss of the .principle, the lime 

 grows solid by having it restored. 



That it contributes also to the dissolution of bodies 

 appears hence. During the progress of putrefaction, a 

 volatile matter flies .continual fy from the putrefying sub- 

 stance. And this is no other .than air which is now ex- 

 tricated and thrown oft from a fixed and uneiastic state, 

 but immediately returns to it again on meeting with a 

 proper recipient. 



The preserving lod'ws from putrefaction depends 

 almost in every instance on restraining the flight of the 

 fixed air. For as this cements their constituent parts, 

 so putrefaction, which is the disunion of them, cannot 

 take place while this remains. 



And this air both corrects and prevents putrid acri- 

 3nony in the animal -fluid. Hence any food which does 

 not contain a due proportion of it, is found to promote 

 putrefaction : as do all damaged vegetables, which 

 being ineapable of fermentation, are incapable of pro- 

 <!ucing the due quantity of air. 



BuO pure air is no where to be found. That which 

 surrounds us is the most heterogeneous body in nature* 

 It is no other than an universal diaos, a coiluvies of all 

 lands of bodies. No bodies can withstand the force of 

 lire. And whatever fire can volatilize is found in the air. 

 Hence for instance, the whole fossil kingdom must be 

 .found therein : for all that tribe is convertible into fume. 

 Gold, the most fixed of all, adheres to sulphur in mines, 

 and is raised along with it. All the parts of the animal 

 kingdom must likewise be in the air. For besides the 

 copious effluvia they emit by perspiration (whereby an 

 animal in the course of its duration, impregnates the air 

 with many times the quantity of its own body), any dead 



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